Passive Voice Checker

In an active sentence the doer comes first: "Our finance team reviewed the pricing." In a passive sentence the thing acted on comes first and the doer moves to the end or disappears: "The pricing was reviewed by our finance team", or just "The pricing was reviewed."

English builds the passive from a form of be (or get) and a past participle: was reviewed, has been sent, will be signed, got fired. The famous "Mistakes were made" is passive with no doer at all, which is exactly why it sounds like dodging.

The checker splits your text into sentences (the same rules as the Sentence Counter) and looks in each one for a form of be or get, at most two small words such as not or quickly, and then a past participle: a word ending in -ed or one of more than 150 irregular ones such as written, sent, paid and told. Modals and have before it are part of the highlight, so you see "should have been delivered" as one piece.

It skips adjectives that only look like participles ("I am interested in a demo", "we were excited about the launch") unless by follows, and phrases such as supposed to, set to and get started. When the sentence names the doer after by, the list shows it, so you know whom to move to the front; by Friday and by email are not doers.

It is a rule-based heuristic, not a grammar parser. It can miss a passive without a form of be ("the report, written last week, ...") and now and then flags an adjective that looks like a participle. Treat the highlight as a pointer to read the sentence again.

The passive is the right choice when the doer is unknown or does not matter ("The office was built in 1990"), when the thing acted on is the topic ("Your order has been shipped"), and in methods sections, where the steps matter more than who did them.

It goes wrong when it hides who is responsible, or when a page of it makes every sentence longer and vaguer. Look at the share: a few passive sentences in a long email are normal; half of them is worth a second pass.

In sales writing the passive often reads as evasive. "The price was increased" makes the buyer ask who increased it; "We increased the price because the steel cost rose 8%" answers before they ask. "A discount has been approved" is weaker than "I got you a 10% discount".

Use the active voice for commitments and next steps ("I will send the contract on Monday"), and keep the passive for what genuinely has no doer ("The meeting was moved to Tuesday").